Infested | Movie review

For a tense film full of creepy crawly fun, check out Infested now streaming on Shudder

If you're looking for a good creature feature, and frankly, who isn’t, you could do a lot worse than Infested. Released last month on streaming, this tensely-plotted French film is all about everyone's favorite phobia (or at least mine, anyway)—spiders. A shady but roguishly handsome grifter named Kaleb (played by Theéo Christine) unwittingly brings a new form of venomous spider into his run-down—and extremely crowded—tenement building. Without spoiling too much, the spider gets out of confinement, lays a crapload of eggs, and the offspring grow up outrageously fast and swarm the building, trapping hundreds of people inside.

 The film deftly blends suspense and horror to keep viewers on edge while the tenants battle the eight-legged invaders. The acting is pretty decent, including Christine, who brings the perfect blend of arrogance, toughness, and vulnerability to the lead role: Kaleb is a small-time shoe scalper who takes great pride in delivering a quality product to his often shady clients. Director Sébastien Vanicek supercharges the tension using claustrophobic spaces and darkness to enhance the creeping dread. The final sequence in the parking garage is just plain nutso, even if it ended a bit too quickly for my tastes.  

 Infested is a fun enough thriller, you know, if you’re willing to overlook a minor thing called logic—the spiders take over in a matter of hours and grow to sizes that are unimaginable. But it’s an entertaining enough film if you can suspend your disbelief and have a few hours to kill. Be warned, though: you’ll be checking for spiders under your sheets before you go to bed. Infested is now streaming on Shudder and The Roku Channel. Sleep tight, y’all.

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